What If Hulk Hogan Had Never Existed?

#4 Roddy Piper Wins A World Championship

Roddy Piper may have been a world champion

Roddy Piper stands out as one of the most talented and most famous wrestling stars to have never won a recognized world championship.

The conventional wisdom associated with this fact is that he was perceived not to need a world title, and in that era of wrestling, it wasn’t so unusual for a top tier guy to not necessarily have a title reign.

Piper and Hulk Hogan have each commented from their own perspectives on their legendary 1980s rivalry (and, to an extent on their less celebrated 1990s feud in WCW).

The consensus seems to be that Piper never wanted to absorb a pinfall loss in order to protect his character, and Hogan was unwilling to consider dropping the title to him for fear he’d never get the title back.

In lieu of a star as powerfully over and money-making as Hogan, WWE may not have been so committed to having just one face stay on top in the 1980s, and may not have had someone to yield as much influence over his own character as Hogan.

There’s every reason to think Piper may have had at least a short reign, feuding against the surrogate top faces of his day.